The present invention relates to a subject-information acquisition apparatus that receives elastic waves propagating in a subject and that acquires characteristic information of the subject, the apparatus comprising a receiver including an element that receives the elastic waves and converts the elastic waves to an electrical signal； a region designating unit that designates a region of the subject in which the characteristics information is to be acquired； a scanning unit that scans the subject with the receiver on the basis of the region； a presenting unit； and a control unit that acquires information about the time that the receiver scans the region or information about the sum of the region scanning time and an additional time and that causes the presenting unit to present the acquired time information.
